124, 2/2

Poi sent, ‘He made Syllea’s tea, then drank it. Half of a blueweed cigarette put him right to sleep. Before he crashed, he said not to wait for him if the Hunt starts, and that he wishes you luck.’

Sitting on a bench just outside of the Celebration House, Jane sighed. ‘Thank you, Poi.’

Poi signed off with a telepathic nod; severing their connection.

Jane sat back on the bench, and looked up.

Steel-Branch loomed high above, like a collection of steel tubing in the shape of a massive, oversized tree. Those steel tubes vanished into the permanent thunderhead that was Steel-Branch’s canopy, where electrical discharges constantly zapped out of sight. The Arbor was a thing of lightning and steel, and he was amazing.

Everything in Treehome was amazing.

While her father slept yesterday, Jane had explored the city, from the Adventurer’s Guildhouse, where she spotted no less than four quests in the Forest that she wanted to pursue, to Arbor Heral-ken Healer’s House, which was basically a giant spa. All three of them, Teressa, Kiri, and Jane, had readily taken to a full spa treatment, which was not called a ‘spa treatment’, but instead a ‘bath day’. Just those two trips had eaten up several hours, and they had gotten to Steel-Branch’s Celebration Hunt House way too late. Today, she had visited Arbor Steel-Branch’s Celebration House first, signed up, and then took a trip over to Arbor Ikabobbi’s ‘Polymorph Emporium’. She wasn’t rich enough or involved enough in the right circles to merit getting into the actual auction, but she did manage to see listings for several of the rarer monsters out there. Jane almost spoke up about who her father was in order to secure a spot at the exclusive auction, but after having that thought, she instantly recoiled from herself.

She would not be that kind of person!

What a weird thought to have, anyway.

So instead of bidding on new [Polymorph] forms, she was having fun at the Celebration House, at the very Forest Edge of Steel-Branch’s District, waiting for the night to start. The houses of this place were steel-walled, and the Celebration House was no exception. Jane thought that calling it a ‘house’ was rather generous, though, as it was basically just a steel circus tent in a vast clearing, with seven of eight sides open, where several bonfires raged around the interior, and people signed up for the Celebration Hunt and other activities. Jane, Kiri, and Teressa were all outside the House, sitting on a bench, killing time.

They might have just been killing time, but being here was the most fun Jane had had in awhile, because while people waited for the Celebration Hunt, they also—

“You! Human girl!”

Kiri, sitting to Jane’s left, said, “Oh gods, here we go again.”

“Oh you like it!” Jane whispered right at Kiri.

Teressa murmured, “I certainly enjoy it.”

Kiri hummed.

Jane didn’t give Kiri another thought. Instead, she regarded her newest best friend. He was a male orcol, three meters tall and wearing the typical kilt and boots a lot of guys around here wore. He was a bit on the brawny side, but there was definitely some magic going on around him and his two friends. Jane wore nothing but her conjured armor, which was like wearing conjured rocks that moved like liquid across her skin. Currently, her helmet was down, but Jane could flex her armor aura and put it right back up, if she needed. But she didn’t. It probably would have helped to hide her smile, though.

Jane stood up and played at being an offended person, “What the fuck you want, little boy!”

“Little!” The man chuckled darkly, spreading his arms wide as he said, “Little girl in weak armor calls me little? You have no eyes to see! Or maybe you conjured your armor wrong. You’re obviously incompetent.”

Jane almost retorted.

But the man stepped closer, to tower over her, as he said, “Another obvious thing is that I won’t be dying to you fucking up while we’re out there, so how about you let me take that leaf from your chest and we can all save ourselves the duty of informing your parents of your death.”

Jane barely felt the weight of the wooden leaf on her armored chest as she stared up into the unknown man’s eyes. She raised her voice loud enough for everyone on every other nearby bench to hear her, and said, “Anyone need to use the bathroom or go for a snack before I put this dude on the ground? Well too bad! We’re getting close to go-time!”

One pair of women on another nearby bench, called back, “We already got our snacks!”

The other woman of that pair held up some caramel apples.

… Caramel apples?! Where were they selling those? As Jane looked around, her eyes searching for the caramel apple vendor, she only found the candied nut and meat-stick vendors, and the eyes of people watching her confrontation with her newest friend.

The challenger spoke loud enough for the audience, as he practically yelled at Jane, “They won’t save you now! You picked up the leaf, you owe the Forest blood.”

Jane stared him straight in the eyes, saying, “And when I win, you owe me some caramel apples.” She called out to the pair of women, “Where’d you get those?”

“Down that street there, girl!”

Jane gestured the way the woman had pointed, saying to the man, and the man’s friend, “If you want to save yourself some embarrassment, you can have your little friend go get them apples now. I didn’t know they had caramel apples here.”

The other man with the challenger, who was slightly taller than the challenger, smiled, saying, “I want some apples.”

The challenger frowned at his friend, and with a theater voice, demanded “What is this betrayal?”

The friend whispered, “You don’t come to a Hunt without knowing your shit, and that goes triple for non-orcols. She’s gonna pound you good, mate.”

“Enough talk!” The challenger ignored his friend, and said to Jane, “I challenge you for the right to Hunt.”

“Accepted!” Jane loudly said, “Three offensive magics, three rises!” She quietly added, “I’m Jane.”

Loudly, the challenger said, “Accepted!” He softly added, “Kordon.”

Jane happily added, “Just so you know, I have [Greater Treat Wounds], so we’re gonna have some good fun.”

Chuckles and laughter erupted from almost everyone listening in to the conversation, but instead of paling like the last two guys, Kordon chuckled, too, looking like a tiger ready to devour a goat.

Oh. That was good.

Jane smiled, looking forward to the coming fight.

– – – –

Jane stood on one side of a 20 meter diameter flat circle of land, well outside of the challenging zone, but before the Forest began. Kordon stood on the other side. All around them were other dueling rings, where people fought for the right to Hunt, and most of the audience, who watched as people bled and fought on the hard-packed sand. All of the rings had been full when Jane and Kordon showed, but they only had to wait two minutes for a ring to open up. In that wait, the ringmaster for the current area welcomed Jane back to the battlefield, asked her to heal a few people if she could, which she did, and gave Kordon a pitying look.

Kordon didn’t like that.

Jane almost laughed as she stepped up to the line in the sand that was her starting point.

Kordon stepped up to his own line.

The announcer stepped between them, while people in the audience looked their way. More looked Jane’s way this time than the first three times she had done this, filling her with a happy feeling in her gut.

For just the two of them, the announcer said, “No lethal Skills or Spells.” Then he spoke for all who cared to hear, “In this ring, we have Jane on one side, and Kordon on the other. A usual fight with the usual limit of three offensive skills, and an end when someone gets up three times!” He stepped away. When he reached the edge, he shouted, “Begin!”

For the first time of the day, Jane’s opponent surprised her. Kordon activated an Elemental Body. That was her shtick! Jane couldn’t help but chuckle while the towering orcol began to flake apart, like falling, burning leaves.

Now a mass of burning ash vaguely in the shape of a four meter tall orcol, Kordon whispered, “I had heard that there was a human girl with a few different Elemental Bodies hanging around, looking to get her ass whooped. I hope I didn’t pick the wrong one.”

Jane shifted to shadow, happily saying, “You’re the first one I get to use Shadow against!”

The air burst with brilliant fire, crashing into Jane’s shadow form, turning her solid and dispersing the smaller shadows across the small battlefield. Ash rolled forward, turning brilliant. Hot. Radiant… Actually radiant, too, now that Jane had a second look. His Elemental Body wasn’t just Ash. He had a Lightform in there, too.

Ah. Maybe she shouldn’t have called out what form she was using.

Jane moved, shadowstepping, but only getting half as far as she expected.

Briefly, she thought back to her father’s words. She saw weakness in her own steps, and considered a Domain. If she had a [Shadow Domain], then Kordon’s little lightshow wouldn’t have done shit.

And then she got her head back in the game.

Superheated Ash, or maybe just Radiance, consumed the spot where Jane had once stood. Kordon rolled her way, barely needing a second to shift direction.

In any other scenario, Jane would have shifted elemental bodies. If this were a violent scenario, she would have gone for the kill with Water and Wind, while also turning on her Frost Owl’s [Freezing Aura], becoming a gale force sleet storm, to turn Kordon into a pile of frozen ash. But that would have harmed him a lot more than she was willing to harm. This was a fun-time feel-good duel. Not a duel to the death.

So Jane flicked a cast of [Shadoward] into the air. Ribbons of shadow scattered throughout the whole arena. Jane dove into those shadows. Kordon rolled through the battlefield, searching for Jane, sending radiant ash into the shadowed pathways, and yet accomplishing nothing. He wouldn’t find her that way, for Jane had already cast [Erase Presence]. That was her third offensive spell, and though it was likely that no one saw it, or understood that she had used up her allotment of abilities for the fight, she would know. Besides that, [Greater Shadowalk], [Shadoward], and [Erase Presence] were game-enders for any normal fight, for she had been practicing with her [Greater Shadowalk] ever since her father had shown her how to remake a few of the basic tier spells.

Jane emerged five meters behind Kordon’s flaming tumbleweed form.

Kordon [Blink]ed right on top of her. That was his second magic, then. He probably used something like [Hunter’s Instincts], too. He was rather very quick, after all.

But he had made a mistake. He landed on something that only looked like Jane. Kordon tore up one of Jane’s shadow clones, and Jane watched from the shadowed pathways in the air. She hadn’t been able to make [Shadow Clone]; not yet, anyway. But a bit of shadow in the shape of herself was a great distraction.

Jane barely poked out of the [Shadoward] in three different locations around the battlefield. From each one, she flexed her [Greater Shadowalk]. [Shadow Bolt]s peppered Kordon like splashes of dark water, breaking up the glows of his radiant tumbleweed form. With a second concentration, [Shadow Beam]s splashed against the man, carving ashy edges off of his body.

Kordon shifted again, this time back into something closer to his orcol form. Jane aimed her blue-grey beams at him for just a second, but he had expert Elemental Body control; he ‘dodged’ her beams by pulling his ashy self out of their way. Jane aimed her beams to the side; the guy was obviously done fighting. That’s why he stopped, right?

She dropped out of her [Shadoward] to the right of where Kordon was searching. “What’s happening here?”

“If you’re gonna cheat using more abilities, at least have the decency to make it less obvious.”

Some people in the gathered crowd boo’d the lack of blood on the arena flood. Others told Kordon to suck it up and let the human do what she wanted.

Wait.

‘Let the human do what she wanted’?

Jane zeroed in on the audience members who said that last thing. “What is that supposed to mean?!”

The guy in the audience shrugged. “It’s just for fun, anyway.”

“You think I’m cheating!” And now Jane was mad. She exclaimed, “I’ve only used three!” She tapped the shadowed pathways above her with a shadowy tendril. “One! [Shadoward]!” She extended her immaterial hands. “[Shadowalk].” And now that Kordon was staring right at her and his light was off, she shadowstepped to the right. Kordon briefly lost track of her. Jane said, “[Erase Presence].”

Kordon held out a few floating, ashy fingers, saying, “[Shadowbolt]. [Shadowbeam]. [Shadowstep]. [Hunter’s Instincts].”

Jane scoffed. “So we’re back to trash talking now, huh? Is my natural hunting so much that you have to call it a Skill?”

Kordon smiled rather meanly, saying, “If you want to go all out, we can take this into the Forest.”

The audience bemoaned, “Nooo!” and, “Aww!”

Jane held her hand to the side, saying, “Look. Dude. Just because you can’t do it, doesn’t mean other people can’t. Watch.” Jane concentrated on the shadowed pathways in the air, focusing her [Greater Shadowalk], concentrating on what she had learned. She hadn’t ever done this for an audience, but she had done it in practice a few times.

Her concentration clicked.

A dozen [Shadow Beam]s and a good fifty [Shadow Bolt]s descended from the shadowed air. Dust flew up, as a wash of Shadow Magic impacted hard dirt, making a noise like a sudden storm on a tin roof; there and gone. Jane cut her [Shadow Beam]s short; no need to let them go their full duration.

Jane watched as Kordon lost his smile, then said, “See? Just learn your Elemental Body better.” She waited for him to say something, and when he continued to stare with floating, ashy eyes, she turned to the audience. “Did you guys really think I was cheating this whole time?”

“It’s not a big deal.” “Yes.” “Well yeah.” “Yes.”

One man’s jaw dropped as his eyes bugged out at his fellow audience members. He shouted, “She didn’t cheat! Of all the ignorant—”

Everyone looked the man’s way.

The man stood up. He was a normal enough looking orcol man, maybe in his sixties, and wearing normal clothes. He said, “She lied about the three abilities she’s using, but if you ignorant children can’t figure out which one, then you don’t deserve to know.”

Jane could accept that. She gestured to the guy, saying, “Thank you!”

The man sat back down. Two other audience members instantly bothered him with questions, but he waved them off and went back to eating his caramel apple.

How had she not seen those apples until now? Did the store just open?

Jane turned back to Kordon. “Done whining?”

He frowned. He lost his frown. He went, “Huh.” And then he regarded Jane again, saying, “I guess I am. Apologies.”

Jane instantly unloaded a good two hundred [Shadow Bolts] at him.

“Apology accepted.”

Kordon’s ashy body went sailing out of the ring from the force of the condensed attack. When he landed, he rolled, his body turning from ash, to bleeding, bloody flesh. For the briefest of moments, he was conscious, and sitting on his ass. He glanced to Jane, said, “I deserved that,” and then his eyes rolled backward. He smacked the ground with a thud.

Jane was already at his side, casting [Greater Treat Wounds].

He didn’t get up till ten minutes later and under the care of the other healers on stand by, but by that time a different pair of would-be hunters were already in the ring, duking it out with fire and water, and in a much more normal way than Jane and Kordon had fought. Jane could have had that! If only some less excitable guy had challenged her— Wait. Where did Kordon go? She only looked away for a minute.

Ah. Whatever!

– – – –

Jane sat upon her bench, waiting for another challenger, but doubting that she’d get one. By now, word of her prowess had gotten around, and the few people who came her way all ended up veering off at the last minute, because they saw that everyone on the nearby benches were watching, and waiting. Some of the would-be new-friends even had the audacity to bow and call her ma’am, before finding someone else to fight!

Of all the chicken shit things to do!

“What the fuck.” Jane asked, “Why no more challengers?”

Teressa said, “There’s holding back for a fun duel, and then there’s being a punching rock.”

“Dammit all.” What was she gonna do now? She leaned over to Kiri, asking, “Got anything you want to do?”

“I’m already doing what I want to do with Sunny, out in the Forest.” Kiri spoke seriously, “That place is dangerous. Sunny’s already been popped a good ten times already.” The little ‘couatl’ on Kiri’s shoulders glittered green in response to her name. Kiri patted her, eliciting a minor riot of rainbow colors from the feathered snake.

Jane turned to her other side, to Teressa, asking, “How about you?”

“I’m already doing it, too.” Teressa said, “I’m [Scry]ing… I’m doing whatever. Don’t worry about me.”

For all her even tone, Jane could tell Teressa was hurting.

Jane asked no more; not wanting to get pulled into the slightly older woman’s tragedy. Sure, she could be there for her if Teressa asked, but she was not comfortable with putting herself out there like her father had when they first got to the hotel room. Even thinking back to what she overheard yesterday…

Jane cringed.

She knew it was silly. She knew Teressa had done right by her father, and therefore she should do right by Teressa. But Jane just couldn’t be that emotional kind of person. It wasn’t happening—

Kordon stepped into sight, looking contrite, with his tall friend at his side. But even better than knowing the guy was actually okay, was the fact that he had a bunch of caramel apples on sticks in one hand.

Jane whispered to herself, “Oh oh oh. What’s this?”

Kiri and Teressa whipped around to see what Jane was seeing.

Kordon and his friend walked toward Jane.

Jane smiled as he approached, saying, “You’re not dead of internal injuries somewhere, so that’s good!”

Kordon dispersed his subdued look, turning back into the hothead he was before, saying, “Of course not! I have healing spells too!”

Jane teased, “Are you sure you’re using them right? Don’t want to end up with accidental bones in your body, or an extra spleen.”

Kiri mumbled, “Honestly, Jane.”

Teressa smiled.

The very second he got close enough, Kordon shoved the caramel apples toward Jane, saying, “Here! As agreed!”

Teressa teased, “You should [Cleanse] those. He could be trying to poison you before a rematch.”

“I would never!” Kordon squeaked.

Kiri got into the spirit, saying, “You stopped the fight halfway through because of suspected cheating. Could just be a strategy.”

“That’s right!” Teressa added, “You’re still technically in your first fight because that was only one ‘down’ out of three.”

Jane laughed.

Kordon shoved the caramel apples at her, again. “You won, alright! Take your prize!”

Jane happily took the apples, saying, “Thank you very much, Kordon.”

Kordon instantly turned demure. Standing there, wearing just a kilt and some boots and being three meters tall with enough muscles to put human bodybuilders to shame, lessened the effect, a bit. But Jane was sure she saw the man blush. And then Kordon steeled himself, and asked, “Would you three ladies like to Hunt together, tonight? So far it’s just me and my friend Gweko here.”

Jane asked the other ‘ladies’, “I’m game if you two are.”

Kiri said, “I don’t want to actually hunt.”

“I’m going!” Teressa happily said, “Sounds great.”

Jane had been hoping that she could get Teressa to come out to the hunt, but until this moment, the woman had been waffling on actually joining the Celebration Hunt. Her newfound enthusiasm was welcomed, though. Jane might not have been willing to be there when the woman went to visit the graves of her family, but this? Jane could be there for this.

Jane happily said, “We two would love to go on a hunt with you two.” She flicked a [Cleanse] at the apples. Nothing happened, except Kordon frowned, and his friend, Gweko, laughed. Jane said, “So let’s have fun, okay!” as she handed the caramel apples out to Kiri, Teressa, and back to Kordon and his friend, saving one for herself, of course.

She bit into it—

Ohhh. She had been right! They looked good, and they were good.

Kiri spoke up, “But what’s happening until the hunt?”

Kordon’s friend said, “Beer?”

Jane agreed, “Beer.”

“Then this is where I sign off.” Kiri got up from the bench, saying, “I’m going back to the hotel room to take a nap. See you kids later!”

Teressa scoffed, “You’re the youngest one here.”

“Coulda fooled me!” Kiri said, walking away, waving her caramel apple as she went.

– – – –

Kiri tossed the caramel apple stick into the trashcan on the street corner, and then she paused. To the right was the road leading back to the Holy O’kabil. To the left…

She looked to the left, toward Arbor Redarrow. The massive tree loomed above a district of volcanic-rock buildings, looking like a copse of grey-barked trees, fifteen in all, with a shared canopy of red clouds, atop a land of black. It was quite an elegant sight, in Kiri’s mind, which was appropriate, since Redarrow’s District was home to the Old Dragonkin Expedition Center. The largest repository of ancient dragonkin knowledge anywhere on Veird.

It would also be appropriate to say that the ODEC was the largest repository of Old Dragonkin history anywhere in the known universe.

… And wasn’t that a thought. ‘In the known universe’. Wow. The enormity of that fact had never touched upon her until that moment. Some things were just too big to think about until you actually considered them.

Kiri sharpened a talon against a talon, absentmindedly, as her thoughts drifted.

And then she headed left, toward Redarrow’s District.

– – – –

Giant black buildings reminded Kiri of what she had seen of Candlepoint, and gave her ideas of what Candlepoint might look like if given a few undisturbed centuries to grow. But everything here was sized for orcols, and orcol-heritage dragonkin, like that son of Erick’s friend, Al… Savral! That was his name. That guy was huge. As Kiri looked around, she mentally added, ‘Not as big as these guys, though.’

Kiri didn’t know what she expected, walking into this district, but she certainly didn’t expect to continue to feel small.

… Maybe it was just nerves, making her feel small.

Ever since Erick had walked out of Ar’Kendrithyst, Kiri had felt odd. Half the time, she felt as though a weight she didn’t know she had been holding, was suddenly gone. The other half of the time she considered the Absolute Vacuum of the Void Beyond the Script, and wasn’t that just terrifying in a whole new way. The AV and the VBS were just sometimes-frights, though. There were many others beyond that one. Like the fact that every shadow on Veird contained Melemizargo. Or that without a Domain she could and likely would be crushed in an instant, considering what Erick got up to when he wasn’t changing how the world viewed magic.

The Holy O’kabil had just walked into Erick’s [Prismatic Ward], without a care. Now that was an interesting expression of a Domain’s power. And then there was the fact that the Holy O’kabil was able to project a body outside of her own body, which was interesting enough to make Kiri reevaluate what she knew about [Familiar]s and magic. As thoughts turned into more thoughts, and Kiri felt on the precipice of a descent into Underworld madness…

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

She found herself at the Old Dragonkin Expedition Center well before she was ready to walk in. So she sat down across the street at a public garden full of lights and smaller red trees to watch the crowd, and to think.

The ODEC was a primary part of Redarrow’s District, situated directly below the outer boughs of the Arbor’s main grove, and composing over half of the center buildings. The other half of those central buildings were private spaces which were blocked to the public, but which housed the people who worked here at the ODEC, and the people in charge of the Redarrow Tribe.

Chieftains? Was that what they had? Kiri couldn’t quite remember.

It was either Chieftains or Patriarchs (or Matriarchs), one of the two.

The Old Dragonkin Expedition Center was a massive edifice of black stone that looked as though it had been chipped out of obsidian, with hard edges everywhere and shiny surfaces between. Kiri knew that most of that was just lightward coloring and one-way glass, but the effect was beautiful to see. The main archway of the building led directly to the main museum, and Kiri wanted to go in, but then she saw the sign hanging over the door, and everything changed.

She didn’t want to go in.

Bad memories surfaced, and it was suddenly as though all the growth she had done as a person was laid low, and all her old hatreds resurfaced. She thought of the nobility of Tower Town, and the institutional bullying, and the boot on the neck of every dragonkin back home. How that one idiot shitstain of a noble’s son used to talk about how ‘all dragonkin are good for is wyrm food’. Kiri didn’t even want to think of his name, but it came to her anyway. Teddric Watfield.

Fuck that guy.

Fuck the Greensoil Republic, too.

And fuck her ancestors for dying and leaving this world a mess for all the dragonkin to come.

She was having irrational thoughts again. Her ‘ancestors’ were not the Old Dragonkin. Those assholes weren’t responsible for their own deaths. Kiri’s ‘ancestors’ were the bastard sons and daughters of dragons that couldn’t keep their dicks and cunts to themselves, after the Old Dragonkin were all dead.

Fucking dragons! Those ‘people’ are the real problem. They spawned children the world over, then left their ‘weak’ halfbreeds behind when they ‘couldn’t keep up’ with their fathers or mothers! It was their actions that forced their abandoned children to live like second class citizens the world over, because not only could they not keep their genitals in their pants, but they couldn’t keep from going to war with one another if they ever met another dragon on the street, either!